Two types of Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) deployment include Fiber to the Node (FTTN) and Fiber to the Premise (FTTP). In FTTN, fiber optic cables are used to connect the central hub of a network service provider to a neighborhood node within approximately 3000 feet of customer homes. Copper wires are then used to connect the node to each individual home. FTTN provides approximately 20 to 25 Mbps network capacity. This is a significant improvement over current network infrastructures where copper wires are commonly used in the last 6000 feet or so and the available bandwidth is limited to 1.5-6.0 Mbps. In contrast, FTTP brings fiber directly to each individual customer home and can provide up to 39 Mbps bandwidth. However, the deployment and maintenance of FTTP can be expensive. It is estimated that FTTP requires approximately five times the capital investment of FTTN, and the deployment of FTTP can take four times as long as that of FTTN. Additionally, the capacity of the video servers in the network can quickly become a bottleneck.
In response to these cost and capacity problems, some IPTV systems have implemented a peer-to-peer (P2P) communication system. In such systems, end users (i.e., peers) interested in file sharing participate as both clients and servers, typically through an application overlay network. When a user locates an interesting file from another user, the downloading happens directly between the two without going through a central server. However, up to this point in time, IPTV P2P systems have viewed the underlying network as a cloud, and have not addressed the underlying infrastructure of a complex IPTV network. The art is therefore in need of a different approach in P2P streaming in IPTV networks.